EDP Club Standards

The EDP provides a competitive environment where clubs respected for their developmental values can both compete with each other, and work together, to promote the growth of soccer in the U.S.

All Clubs with teams in the EDP are expected to meet all of the following requirements, or to meet most of them and be making significant progress toward meeting all of them.

Mission, Philosophy and Programming

Club fields high quality premier teams in multiple age groups.
Club has a track record of developing players over the long-term; this goal takes precedence over commercial interests or winning in the short term.
Coaches place an emphasis on development of personal traits for success as adult players: college, pro, etc.
College placement an integral part of program mission. 
Club actively supports EDP College showcases and College ID initiatives.
Integrity and truthfulness in promoting programs.

Governance and Structure

Professional D.O.C to whom all coaches report. All coaches professionally qualified.
Responsive and decision-empowered primary contact to liaise in both directions with EDP on behalf of all teams and the D.O.C  
Parents are not coaches of their own children's teams

Participation

All club’s regionally competitive teams participate in EDP in both Boys and Girls brackets. (Exception for ECNL teams) 
Participation in key EDP events is the first priority for all club’s EDP teams with only rare exceptions.
Teams place EDP participation over other competitions and are available for regular weekly EDP games and EDP showcase events.

Game Management

Three-referee systems for all 11v11 games and adherence to EDP game lengths. 
Coach, Parent and Player conduct is respectful to all parties from both teams.
With some exceptions follow best practices: 3-1 practice game ratio: avoid more than one game per day.

Roster Development

Team rosters are formed through open and fair publicly announced tryouts.
Clubs behave professionally in recruiting players and operating tryouts
In-year player transfers between EDP clubs occur only with cooperation of both clubs.
Clubs respect the integrity of programs in their local community of classic and premier programs, and seek to build positive relations with them.